


My Memory Has Just Been Sold

by aewriting



Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: F/M, Injury Recovery, Jealousy, Lost Decade, M/M, Sex Tape, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-06
Updated: 2020-01-06
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:54:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22142101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aewriting/pseuds/aewriting
Summary: This is based on a prompt from the RNM Kink Meme:Set during the lost decade.  During a rare private moment in the military, Alex searches for some porn to take care of business, and is shocked to see someone very familiar...
Relationships: Michael Guerin/Alex Manes, Michael Guerin/Other(s)
Comments: 31
Kudos: 146





	My Memory Has Just Been Sold

**Author's Note:**

> I saw this prompt on the RNM Kink Meme. Please mind the tags. Also, thank you to the anonymous poster that suggested this fic. I hope you enjoy.

It’s hard sometimes.

It’s just… god, it’s really fucking hard.

He’s at a training at some nondescript conference center in Leesburg, Virginia. It’s multiday, covering specific updates to the military’s integrated software platforms. In other words, it’s boring as fuck. Like, half is irrelevant to his work, and the other half he will probably have to review again anyway before putting anything into practice.

And there’s a guy.

James. Stationed out of Vandenberg AFB. California.

They’re the same rank. He’s got a wicked sense of humor. Sat next to Alex the last two days. They had lunch together in the cafeteria. Big hands. Taller than Alex. Serious-looking, till he smiles. And he’s smiled at Alex.

Fuck.

If… if this was anywhere else… yeah, just about anywhere else, Alex would have said something. Put out feelers in some way. But here? At a fucking military training?

Some of the guys are going out tonight. They’re getting a car into the city, to a club. Dinner, too. It’s almost an hour drive, and it’s stupid, Alex thinks, and…

God, he envies them. He envies the ease with which they can talk about it. Picking up girls, getting laid.

It’s been a while, for him. Before his first deployment, right before. Home in Roswell, on leave. Michael has this, this crazy trailer now. Like, Alex is glad it’s something, but… well, he never really pictured getting laid in a trailer. But, if he’s being honest with himself, he’d have sex just about anywhere, if it meant having sex with Michael.

Of course things had ended badly, because they always did with Michael. Words were exchanged – mean, cutting ones.

And god, this is the last thing he wants to think of right now. He, he’s got a room to himself. A nice shower, decent bed. Actual privacy.

One of the advantages of being a codebreaker is knowing how to… circumvent certain safeguards, engage in particular activities undetected.

Alex wants to watch some porn.

It’s actually not all that often that he does this. It’s so risky, with DADT. They’re saying it’s going to be repealed, but even if it happens, it’s not like Alex is gonna be out waving the rainbow flag. He, he has to keep this under wraps, but it feels safer here than it does on base.

Not safe enough to make a move on _James_.

But safe enough for some porn.

He does his magic with the software and goes to Pornhub. His tastes can vary, depending on his mood, but he just wants something straightforward tonight. He peruses the options, watches some of the little preview clips. Finally settles on one. He grabs a towel and the little lotion sample from the bathroom, and he gets to work.

It’s over quickly. Initially, he thinks about James, but when it really comes down to it, it’s Guerin. He wishes it wasn’t, but it is. Seems like it always is. Alex cleans up and is about to log off the site and wipe his history when he sees it.

Sites like this, suggested videos pop up. He doesn’t care enough to figure out how the suggested videos are determined. Like, if someone is specifically searching for gay porn, why would a video with some woman getting nailed by a fucking cowboy be a suggested…

What the _fuck_?

He’s, he’s seeing things. Or, he thinks he’s seeing things just because he wants to see them. No, not that he _wants_ to see this. Um.

Alex leans in, narrows his eyes at the little thumbnail image.

It’s kind of grainy, and the lighting’s not great – probably an amateur video, not a professional production. The woman in it’s a brunette, very fit but curvy. Alex doesn’t really care about her.

No, the part he cares about is the dude that’s apparently fucking her. Athletic looking, in a rangy kind of way. Tan. Black cowboy hat blocking his face.

Curly hair.

Alex hasn’t watched a porno with a woman in it since he was 14, sitting in the treehouse with Kyle and desperately hoping against hope that he would feel something, anything for the woman in the video rather than his rapidly developing childhood friend.

Against his better judgement, he clicks on the thumbnail, presses play.

It’s _definitely_ an amateur video. If he had to guess, they’re in the girl’s room. He never gets this, why people film this shit with, like, their dirty socks on the bed. Especially with this video, god. Like, someone has clearly gone in after the fact with some editing software and blurred out the faces… and also, he guesses, a tattoo on the girl’s lower back. It’s… honestly, it would be distracting, if you were actually trying to get off on this, he thinks.

The camera’s set up so the bed is right in the middle of the frame.

“ _Knew you’d be down for this_ ,” the girl is saying, flirtatious.

“ _Up for it, actually_ ,” says the guy, and that voice, holy shit.

Holy shit, holy _shit._

He’s almost sure. Like, he’s almost _positive._

And then the guy walks into the frame, stroking himself, wearing the fucking hat, and he _knows._

“Mmmm,” murmurs the girl approvingly.

“ _Hat on or off, darlin’_?”

And something clenches in Alex’s chest at that, because ‘darlin’? Fucking ‘ _darlin_ ’?

He’s about to watch a porno with Michael fucking Guerin.

He… he should turn this off right now. Turn it off, go to bed, wake up tomorrow and do his training.

But he can’t stop watching.

And maybe… um, maybe there’s a chance it’s not him. Alex has thought about Michael’s body so many times, tried to catalog it, commit it to memory. Like, he knows the marks, the freckles, the scars…

His mind’s wandered, and he missed Michael (because that’s how he’s thinking of this guy, now) start to go down on this girl. It’s… it’s fucking weird. Like, on the one hand, he does _not_ want to see this. He knows that Michael fucks around when they’re not together. It’s a whole other thing to watch it happen. And with a woman.

But on the other hand…

It’s not like they’ve ever sexted. Exchanged dirty pictures. Done any of those things other couples do. Couples… were they ever a couple?

All he has is his memories, and they’re fading. These visuals, for better or worse, are bringing his own memories back into sharper relief.

He swallows, hard, is about to fast forward, but can’t quite bring himself to do it. Instead, still half-naked himself, he just watches everything unfold.

Girl climaxes. Alex has no idea if it’s real or not. She coaxes the guy over onto his back on the bed. Face is blurred out, but the rest, it… it matches. Something about the languidness of the guy’s posture, the way he strokes at her hair and face as she sucks him off…

Alex didn’t know that he could simultaneously feel so turned on and so devastated. Because if he closes his eyes, doesn’t look, it’s like, it’s like…

_“Yeah darlin’…“_

_“Just like that…”_

_“Mmm, that feels good…”_

It’s him. It’s him.

They do some more shit. They end, perhaps unsurprisingly, with the girl on top, riding him. They make some stupid comment about saving a horse. It cuts off really abruptly, and the whole thing is over in less than ten minutes.

Alex feels dazed, at the end.

Then he watches it again.

***

He watches it more often than he should, he thinks. It’s… it’s hard to actually get off to it, what with the girl, but he’ll focus on Michael sometimes, because it _has_ to be Michael, then maybe turn on one of his preferred videos.

He knows just how to get to it, what to search for.

Sometimes… and this is really sad… sometimes it has nothing to do with sex, when he pulls up the video. Nothing to do with his own urges and wants. He just, just misses Michael, in some aching, fundamental way. It’s sad that this is the closest he can get to him.

***

He knows that his libido should be the least of his worries, after his leg.

And really, it’s months before he even gives it a second thought. If anything, he’s relieved there’s no one in his life. No one special. No one to disappoint.

For a while, he doesn’t know if his sex drive will ever come back, and he’s so depressed that he doesn’t even care.

But then one day, months later, he’s in Walter Reed. He’s at PT. There’s another physical therapist on the other side of the gym, a relatively young guy. Fit. He reaches up to adjust a pulley, his shirt rides up, and…

Huh.

***

The video’s gone.

He tries all the search terms he used months ago, tries different ones. He’s…

He’s disappointed. Shockingly so. But it almost feels fitting. Because he’s not the same as he was. Not at all.

And the cheesy cowboy from that fucking video, and the flesh-and-blood Michael who told him he liked him, had sex with him in the middle of the toolshed, held him in the darkness of his trailer before he deployed to a fucking warzone… those aren’t options for him.

Not anymore.

***

Michael’s living with him at the cabin now. Has been for a few months. It’s an adjustment, for sure. Alex has only ever lived with other airmen, and Michael hasn’t lived with anyone since hitting adulthood. But it’s so fucking worth it. Worth it for the way Michael looks at him in the morning when he makes him coffee, breakfast. Worth it for the way Michael _notices_ things around the cabin and fixes them without Alex saying a word.

Worth it for nights like this, for the way Michael is stripped completely bare and Alex’s for the taking.

“How do you want me, Alex?” he’s whispering.

_Any way,_ Alex wants to say, but he just stares for a moment, takes him in.

Michael licks his lips, pleased at the way Alex is looking at him. A little flick of his wrist, and his black cowboy hat zips through the air, right into his waiting hand. Smirking a little, he uses it to cover himself.

“Hat on or off, darlin’?”

And Alex freezes.

It’s been years. _Years_ since he’s thought of it…

Michael sees the shift immediately, frowns. “What?”

Alex looks skyward, wants to curse himself for ruining the moment.

“What is it?” Michael repeats.

Alex debates saying anything. Really questions it. But ultimately… “Have you ever made a sex tape, Michael?”

His eyebrows shoot up, then his face relaxes. “I could certainly be persuaded. What exactly do you have in mind, _Captain_?”

And at that, Alex heaves a sigh, sits up, and pulls the sheet over his lap. “Ugh, I’m serious, Michael. Have you ever made a sex tape before?” Michael’s scrutinizing him. “ _Not_ with me, Michael.”

“Oh, okay… was gonna say, I think I’d remember that. But, a sex tape? Like, with someone else? Yeah, sure.”

Now it’s Alex’s eyebrows that are shooting up. “Wait, what?”

Michael’s sitting on the bed now, still holding the damn hat. “I mean, yeah, I have.” He’s looking at Alex in confusion. “Why? Is that weird?”

“Um… I guess I don’t know if it’s weird or not. Maybe a little, um, unexpected. Like, how many sex tapes have you made?”

Michael shakes his head. “I don’t really know an exact number. A few?”

“A _few_?”

“I mean… yeah? I don’t really see what the big deal is.”

Alex pursed his lips. “Well, I think at least one of them got posted. Online.”

And Michael, damn him, actually seems curious. “Oh yeah? Which one?”

“Which one…” Alex mutters. “The one where you’re wearing a fucking cowboy hat.”

And Michael grins. “Ohhh yeah, that was Cristina.” Alex is looking at him blankly. “Bartender over at Saturn’s Rings a few years back. She was wild, man.” His brow furrows, then. “She, uh, she told me she was gonna blur my face out before she posted it.”

“Wait, you _knew_ she was going to post it online?”

“Yeah, she asked me about it beforehand. Did she not blur me out?”

Alex sighs. “Nah, it was blurred.”

“Then how did you – “

Alex just stares at him.

“Oh. _”_

_“_ Yeah,” Alex mutters. “Didn’t need your face to tell it was you, Michael.”

Michael’s biting his lip a little. “That was a long time ago that I made that. You… you watch it very often?”

Alex’s mouth twists a bit, and he nods. “Yeah… yeah I did, Michael,” he says, quietly. “It… it was all I had of you, sometimes.”

“Hey,” Michael says, softly. “Hey. You have all of me, now.” He drops the hat, then, takes Alex’s hand and presses it over his heart. “Every last bit.” Alex huffs a sigh, looks down. “Hey,” Michael says, almost sharply. “I’m serious. I… I love you, Alex.”

Alex squeezes Michael’s hand. “I love you, too.”

They stay like that for a moment, pressed together, just breathing. Alex lifts Michael’s hand to his lips, then, gives it a kiss. “Maybe… maybe we can pick back up where we left off?”

Michael smiles. “Yeah, that sounds good.” He begins to move down the bed. Stops. “Just, before we do this, tell me one thing, okay?”

“Okay…?”

“How were the reviews?”

“What?”

“On the video? Like, the comments? What did people say?”

“Oh my _god,_ Michael!”

“Were they, like, marveling at my form?”

“Fuck you.”

“Giving my dick five stars?”

“You’re ridiculous, you know that?”

“Wishing they could find someone to give it to them that good?”

And at that, Alex fixes Michael with a level stare. “In all the years I looked at that goddamn video, there were only two comments. One was some spam about generic erectile dysfunction pills, and the other just said that you should have come on her tits.”

“Huh.”

“Yeah.”

Michael clears his throat, smirks a little. “Don’t think I’ve ever heard you say ‘tits’ before.”

“Yeah, well don’t get used to it.”

“Fair enough,” Michael says, stifling his grin. “You’re gonna have to show me this video sometime.”

“Can’t,” Alex shrugs. “They took it down a while ago.”

“Well that’s a pity,” Michael says. “Depriving the world of this perfect ass.”

Alex narrows his eyes… and gives a little half-smile. “Hear you’re only doing private shows now, cowboy.”

“Mmm,” Michael murmurs, low in his throat. “I think one’s starting right about now.”

Alex grabs the hat, puts it on Michael’s head. “Good.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading. I'm also on tumblr (aewriting).


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